Like a band of Jedi warriors confronting Darth Vader, angry Staten Island parents blasted a school bus driver who reigned over a "Star Wars" fight club - and the school officials who kept the twisted game quiet until yesterday.
"Man, I would love to get my hands on him," Anna DeStefano said of her young son's disgraced bus driver, "Emperor" Michael Cianci.

Cianci, 38, has been suspended from his $1,000-a-week gig, accused of creating a bizarre federation called The Death Cheese Club to keep order on his yellow school bus.

Cianci, who drove the bus to and from Tottenville Middle School, allegedly gave the toughest of the kids nicknames such as Darth, Sith Warrior and Jabba - and encouraged them to pound on weaker kids.

Most parents found out about the mayhem from reading the Daily News and watching TV because the school had failed to send home letters about the problem until yesterday.

Antoinette Spinelli, 32, said her trust had been so shaken that she doesn't think she will put her seventh-grader son back on the bus despite its new driver. "I'm gonna wind up taking my son back and forth now," she said.

Several students identified a small group of Goth kids - who dress mostly in black and are obsessed with punk music - as the ringleaders of the fight club.

"They're maniacs who scream and shove each other," said a sixth-grader, who gave his name only as Richie.

"They're not the popular kids in school, they're different," added a 12-year-old named Catherine. "They think they're so cool, but nobody else thinks so."

Two 11-year-old boys, one of whom was choked and menaced with a pair of scissors, blew the whistle on the torture.

The boys' mothers asked that their sons not be identified.

The mom of one of the boys kept him home yesterday, while the other kid went to class, hoping to find some "normalcy."

Cianci, on the other hand, seemed cowed by his new reputation as Jabba the Nut.

"I don't need this," the balding driver snapped at the Parlin, N.J., house where he lives with his mother, wife, toddler and newborn sons.

"I'm trying to take care of my kids," he said. "Call my lawyer."

One of his neighbors who used to drive a Brooklyn school bus expressed sympathy for Cianci.

"Driving a school bus isn't easy. Some people can't even drive a minivan full of kids," he said. "There has to be discipline on the bus. Everyone has their own system, maybe he was trying to find something to relate to the kids."

Sounds like the same bullshit that's happened on schoolbuses since they existed. I got bullied on the bus and fucking hated it. However, I guess the experience made me an angrier, more sardonic and pissed off asshole, so maybe it's a blessing in disguise.

Everyone will end up having to home school their children. Either because of feeling insecure or absolutely not willing to trust the schools with their children.

To a certain extent, the parents are right:
1.) Kids are killing one another (some are getting SWAT to do it, but let's move on...)
2.) Teachers are abusive (remember the kid who had the tube ripped out by the substitute?)
3.) Teachers (mainly female lately) have been raping the children
4.) Bus drivers like this guy have been pulling more shit. This guy got thugs, one on the news yesterday slapped a mentally handicapped child, and a few months back one got busted for breaking up a fight by beating on the kids.

It's just building and building...it's gonna blow soon. When I finally do have kids, I admit I'm deathly afraid of what they'll be greeted with in, say, 10 years.

Everyone will end up having to home school their children. Either because of feeling insecure or absolutely not willing to trust the schools with their children.

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Personally, I think this conclusion is a little ridiculous. There's abuse in public school regardless of who the child is, what their interest is, etc. It's forever been a constant in public education. Home schooling, while an effective way to educate children, is not a comprehensive education - a home-schooling parent has essentially abstained from teaching the child a very critical subject of study in public school - social relations.

Shit like this "Star Wars fight club" bus ride just happens. It fucking sucks for the kids getting abused. It will mar the records of the kids who were doing the beating. The bus driver loses his job. Everyone suffers a little as a result of it. But it's by no means the apocalyptic end of public school education as we know it.

Some - or all - of those kids will end up having learned a social lesson as a result of it. The lesson, whether it's "don't pick on the kids or the administration will come down on you" or it's "be prepared - some of your classmates are assholes and you may need to get out of a fight" is subjective. However, those lessons are constants in real life. Home school your kid and he'll never figure 'em out.

There are forums on Myspace and facebook named "I went to public school, bitch." It may not be the most tactful way to note that a person is proud of their government-&-tax-funded education, but it gets the point across.

...I must've missed that. $1,000.00 and he's bitching about dealing with kids, so he makes his own little band of mobsters?

Lazy fuck! Pull the bus over and handle it yourself! "I live with my mother. I make $4,000.00 a month. I could live on my own with my wife and child, but I choose to live with my mom and teach kids to beat the shit out of each other and get paid for it. Who wouldn't want to be me?" None of us, cuz I'm sure mom joins in from time to time. Bet you got a hot tub hooked up and everything.

...I must've missed that. $1,000.00 and he's bitching about dealing with kids, so he makes his own little band of mobsters?

Lazy fuck! Pull the bus over and handle it yourself! "I live with my mother. I make $4,000.00 a month. I could live on my own with my wife and child, but I choose to live with my mom and teach kids to beat the shit out of each other and get paid for it. Who wouldn't want to be me?" None of us, cuz I'm sure mom joins in from time to time. Bet you got a hot tub hooked up and everything.

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When you subtract all the weeks that he doesn't drive a bus during the summer, thanksgiving, winter break, and spring break he isn't making that much money.

He might have another job or something. One teacher at my middle school actually drove a bus for another middle school in town.

Story on the radio, which I need to find the article they read, said the Bus Driver gave them "Ranks" like Moff, Admiral, Sith Lord, etc. He would give the stronger kids higher titles, and let them beat the shit out of the weaker kids.

This incident was not right, and i'm not defeding the bus driver, but the presence of this:
"Several students identified a small group of Goth kids - who dress mostly in black and are obsessed with punk music - as the ringleaders of the fight club."
pissed me off.

Persistance of negative connotations like these are only going to perpetuate the idea that kids who are "different" are lesser people than anyone else and will give reasons for ignorant kids that are bigger than them to beat them up, which in turn makes the "different" kids angry and makes them think its ok to beat up kids smaller than they are.

Damn right this world is fucked up.

You may think I'm missing the point that this was a bus driver that allowed kids to beat up other kids, but I haven't. It's not right and he should lose his job. Who knows, what if the bus driver was one of those "different" kids that got beat up when he was younger? its a vicious cycle.